John Harvey - Still Waters

Wiggins shook his head. “Not what we’re hearing so far.”

“Threatened to?”

“Apparently.”

“It’s not possible the officers misinterpreted, heat of the moment?”

“Come on, Charlie.”

“It’s possible, though? Couldn’t he have been handing it over?”

Wiggins chuckled. “Blade first?”

Resnick was on his feet, hands in pockets, pacing the room. “Divine. You know what happened to him. A few months back.”

“I’d heard something.”

“He was raped. Smashed round the face with a baseball bat and raped.”

“Doesn’t excuse …”

Resnick brought the palms of both hands down against the inspector’s desk, flat and fast. “Reasons, not excuses. Reasons. This is a serving officer …”

“Suspended …”

“Sick leave.”

“Same thing.”

Resnick let that pass. “A detective constable with a commendation for bravery …”

“And a knife in his pocket.”

“He’s frightened.”

“Funny way to show it.”

“Ever since he was attacked, frightened. Months before he’d go out at all.”

“Ah, well, always find a reason, eh, Charlie. Search hard enough. Excuses for every fucking thing. I don’t doubt but you could find him some psychiatrist, half an hour in the witness box, make it seem as if nowt ever happened.”

Resnick shook his head. “I just want you to understand.”

“Oh, I understand. One of yours, Charlie, you want to do your best for him, I can appreciate that. Respect it. Good management. Good for the team. But see things from my point of view; think how the papers’d look at it, bloody television, some copper runs amok with a blade and we pat him on the head and tell him to take it easy, dole out a few aspirin.”

“That’s not what I’m saying. Not what I want.”

“What do you want, Charlie?”

“To think your people’d treat him with some understanding. And go easy when it comes to laying charges. Think about the whole picture.”

“The whole picture,” Wiggins smirked. “We’re good at that. Noted.”

“Don’t keep him locked up longer than you have to. Whatever else, ask for police bail, don’t let him fetch up inside on remand.”

“Not down to me, you know that.”

“You could help.”

Wiggins stubbed out his cigarette and stopped himself halfway through tapping out another. “Filthy bloody habit.” Thinking better of it, he lit up anyway. “All right, Charlie. No promises, but …” He got to his feet, held out his hand. “You have another word with him before you go. Make sure he’s going to play it right. Penitent and contrite. You’ve already fixed a decent brief for him, I dare say.”

After arriving at Derby police station, Resnick had put in a call to Suzanne Olds. The solicitor was waiting for him in the corridor near the custody area and the police cells. Leather briefcase, tailored suit, legs long enough to turn heads.

“You’ve spoken to him?” Resnick asked.

“It’s not easy getting him to say much at all. Except he doesn’t care what happens to him, that’s clear.”

“About this?”

“Anything.”

“You’ll change his mind.”

“I’ll try.”

Resnick shook her hand. “I owe you for this.”

“I’ll make sure you pay.”

Lynn Kellogg was waiting for him in the corridor. Since passing her sergeant’s board, she had taken to wearing more severe colors, this morning an austere mid-calf skirt and matching jacket, flat black shoes, and a blouse like sour milk. She had let her hair grow out a little, but it was still short. A little makeup around the eyes, a touch on the lips.

“My transfer, sir …”

“I thought you might have been waiting for news about Mark. Or maybe you didn’t know.”

“Yes, Graham said.”

“And you didn’t care.”

“That’s not fair.”

“No? Probably not.” He started walking and Lynn followed, hurrying into step beside him.

“I know there wasn’t any love lost between us, but that doesn’t mean I’m not concerned about what’s happened.”

Just not high on your list of priorities, Resnick thought. He was surprised to be accusing her of anything less than compassion.

“He is all right?” Lynn said.

“No. No, he’s not.”

They were almost at the stairs, a dogleg that would take them into a second corridor, the entrance to the CID room immediately ahead.

“It is three weeks now,” Lynn said, “since my transfer was supposed to have gone through.”

“These things take time.”

“I know, only …”

“You can’t wait to be away.”

She found a thread, loose on the sleeve of her jacket, and snapped it free. A uniformed officer came along the lower corridor, taking his time of it, and they stood back to let him pass.

“Now I’ve made up my mind, I think it will be easier, that’s all.” She was not looking at him as she spoke, looking everywhere but at his face. “For both of us perhaps.”

The daughter he had never had, the lover she would never be . It hung between them, largely unspoken, unresolved, so tangible that if either of them had reached out they could have touched it, grasped it with both hands.

“The Family Support Unit,” Resnick said. “I’ll give them a call. See what’s holding things up.”

“Thanks.” Lynn standing there, arms folded tight across her chest.

There was a message from his friend Norman Mann of the Drugs Squad to contact him whenever he got his head above water, nothing urgent; another from Reg Cossall-a drink some time, Charlie, bend your ear. Set this bastard job to rights. Someone, Naylor’s handwriting it looked like, had fielded a call from Sister Teresa, the time and a number and a promise to call again. Two routine faxes requesting information about young people gone missing: a fifteen-year-old girl from Rotterdam, last seen on the Dover ferry, a thirteen-year-old boy from Aberdeen.

The phone rang and, picking up, he identified himself. Miriam Johnson’s clear but genteel voice was easy to recognize.

“It was your associate, Inspector, that I was hoping to speak with. I remembered something, you see, regarding the paintings.”

“DC Vincent’s not here at the moment,” Resnick said. “Will I do?”

He could nip across to Canning Circus, pick up a double espresso, and take his time strolling down through the Park, breathe some air, stretch his legs.

She had rich tea biscuits waiting for him, symmetrically arranged on a floral plate, Earl Grey tea freshly brewed. “Milk or lemon, Inspector?”

“As it comes will be fine.”

They were sitting in the conservatory at the back of the house, looking out over a hundred feet of tiered garden, mostly lawn. Near the bottom was a large magnolia tree, which had long lost its blossom. Inside the conservatory, shades of geranium pressed up against the glass, herbs, inch-high cuttings in small brown pots.

“I can’t be certain this is relevant, of course, but I thought, well, if it were and I neglected to bring it to your attention …”

Resnick looked at her encouragingly and decided to dunk his biscuit after all.

“It would be some time ago now, more than a year. Yes. I was trying to get it clear in my mind before. You’re busy, of course, all of you, and the last thing I wanted to do was waste your time, but the nearest I could pin it down would be the early summer of last year.” Her gaze shifted off along the garden. “The magnolia was still in flower. He made specific mention of it, which is why I can remember.”

She smiled and lifted her teacup from its saucer; yes, the little finger crooked away.

Resnick waited. He could smell basil, over the scent of the Earl Grey. “Who, Miss Johnson?” he finally asked. “Who mentioned the magnolia?”